Errors Erase 'Golden Dreams' for U.S. Women's Gymnastics Team

After all the mistakes made by the US and China in the last round of team qualifiers, Wednesday's team finals marked a clean slate for both. The US came to Beijing the favorites after claiming gold at the 2007 World Championships. But, China's home field advantage and key mistakes made by the US would prove the combination to victory. After what would seem like an unfortunate series of events, the US Women's Gymnastic Team would settle for silver.

Before the games began, the US struggled with unforeseen issues. Chellsie Memmel hurt an ankle in practice (later disclosed it was actually broken), and would only compete in Wednesdays' finals on the uneven bars. Samantha Peszek also injured an ankle during warm-ups, and would not compete at all Wednesday.

These would be the first of the struggles for the United States Women. During qualifications, the team was plagued with uncharacteristic mistakes. Chellsie Memmel lost her hold on the high bar, and Nastia Liukin, daughter of two former Soviet Olympic champions, fell to her back after miscalculating her dismount from the uneven bars.

Wednesday started out in the right direction for US's dreams of gold. After Shawn Johnson, contender in the all around competition, posted a 16.00 on the vault, and Brigit Sloan and Alicia Sacramone scored solid, as well, the US trumped the Chinese score of 46.350 with a score of 46.875.

The second rotation was the uneven bars, where despite Liukin posting the highest score in any event in the finals with a 16.900, the Chinese outscored the US 49.625 to 47.975. (According to MSBNC, The Chinese have fallen under some scrutiny due to the ages of the athletes who competed in the uneven bar rotation. Multiple reports and investigations have suggested He Kexin, Yuyuan Jiang and Yilin Yang, may all actually fall short of the 16 year age minimum requirement to compete in the Olympics.)

The US was unable to hold it together for the last two rotations, amidst hopes of edging out the Chinese. After an inexplicably long start delay to the beam rotation, Sacramone fell completely off the beam while performing the initial mount. Lutkin and Johnson scored well with 15.975 and 16.175 respectively, and stayed just within sights of the gold falling only 1 point behind the Chinese. But after Sacramone fell once again during floor exercise, stepped out of bounds, and Liukin and Johnson both also stepped out of bounds, the glitters of the gold faded completely.

What was an ill-fated competition from the beginning, ended up with a trip to the medal stand, after all. And, even though they came away with the silver and not gold, the US did a great job finishing with a total score of 186.525.

All scores were obtained from www.NBCOlympics.com

Information obtained from www.MSNBC.com